Longtime NBC U.S. Open announcers Miller, Maltbie part of rich tradition

San Francisco native Ken Venturi won one major championship as a PGA Tour professional, then put on a microphone and became the lead golf analyst for CBS for 35 years.

San Francisco native Ken Venturi won one major championship as a PGA Tour professional, then put on a microphone and became the lead golf analyst for CBS for 35 years.

Photo: Barney Peterson, San Francisco Chronicle

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ADVANCE FOR WEEKEND EDITIONS, JUNE 7-8 - FILE - This undated file photo released by the PGA Tour shows golf anylyst Johnny Miller. This will be the last time Johnny Miller calls the shots. In a surprise move last year, the USGA accepted a 12-year offer worth about $1 billion from Fox Sports, which has never televised golf. This will be the final U.S. Open telecast by NBC Sports, ending a 20-year run with Miller as the lead analyst. (AP Photo/PGA Tour, Rusty Jarrett) less

ADVANCE FOR WEEKEND EDITIONS, JUNE 7-8 - FILE - This undated file photo released by the PGA Tour shows golf anylyst Johnny Miller. This will be the last time Johnny Miller calls the shots. In a surprise move ... more

Photo: Rusty Jarrett, Associated Press

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Roger Maltbie picked up his last check for a PGA Tour event in 1996, but the San Jose native has remained a big part of the golf world through his work with NBC.

Roger Maltbie picked up his last check for a PGA Tour event in 1996, but the San Jose native has remained a big part of the golf world through his work with NBC.

Photo: Kurt Rogers, SFC

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Bob Rosburg was among the earliest course reporters, working for ABC for 31 years.

Bob Rosburg was among the earliest course reporters, working for ABC for 31 years.

Photo: The Chronicle, File 1949

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Former PGA golfer Ken Venturi on the 18th green at the renovated Olympic Club Course in San Francisco, Calif., March 12, 2012.

Former PGA golfer Ken Venturi on the 18th green at the renovated Olympic Club Course in San Francisco, Calif., March 12, 2012.

That was at San Francisco's Lincoln High in the early 1960s, more than three decades before Miller became the brash, distinctive voice of the U.S. Open. Even when he made his broadcast debut, at the 1990 Bob Hope Classic, Miller barely knew a telestrator from a television. He nearly quit after his first day.

"Now I go onto Open telecasts and the nervousness is gone," he said. "I almost don't realize I'm on the air. That's the secret of announcing, after doing your homework."

Miller and colleague Roger Maltbie, who grew up in San Jose and still lives in the South Bay, are preparing for their final U.S. Open this week in Pinehurst, N.C. NBC will end a 20-year run as the network home of America's national championship, giving way to Fox in 2015.

This transition highlights the enduring presence of Miller and Maltbie - and the rich history of Bay Area golf broadcasters. Ken Venturi, another Lincoln High alum, spent 35 years as the lead analyst on CBS, and Bob Rosburg (Washington High) pioneered the role of a course reporter in his 31 years at ABC.

Miller has worked for NBC for 24 years and Maltbie for 22. Also don't forget Kay Cockerill (who grew up in Los Gatos and now lives in San Francisco), with 19 years and counting at Golf Channel, and relative television newcomers Arron Oberholser and Juli Inkster.

So the lesson here: Northern California pros can talk a good game.

The equation often starts with success as a player, considering Venturi, Miller and Inkster combined to win 70 tour events, including 10 majors, and all three are in the Hall of Fame. That obviously attracts the attention of television executives.

They also communicate effectively, albeit in different ways. Miller found his niche with sharp analysis and candid criticism of marquee players. Maltbie is the good-natured Everyman, roaming the course to offer insight from the ground.

"It seems to be more than a coincidence," Maltbie said of the Bay Area connections. "I don't know if this ties to the Northern California lifestyle, but we're pretty much all willing to speak our mind. That's the common thread."

Cockerill, who mostly works LPGA and Web.com Tour events, offered another theory. She pointed to the abundance of great courses in the Bay Area, requiring players to use a wide array of shots in often-challenging weather conditions.

"To play around here, you really have to get used to all the elements," Cockerill said. "So maybe it's a quasi-intelligent golfer who comes out of the Bay Area: a player with all these thoughts in their head that come out of their mouth."

That's a good start, absolutely.

Venturi's path to television prominence probably was the most unlikely. He spoke with such a severe stutter as a child, and endured such relentless bullying from his classmates, that he embraced golf partly because of its solitude.

He was 13 then and had trouble saying merely his name. Venturi never dreamed he could speak without a stutter, let alone spend more than three decades on TV.

Venturi, who died last year at age 82, used to put his mom's big spaghetti pot over his head as he talked, because it helped to hear the echo of his voice.

"When I put a headset on, it was like going back in time and putting the pot over my head," he said in an April 2011 interview. "You can hear an echo, and that's what helped."

Miller felt a kinship with Venturi while growing up in San Francisco, given their shared alma mater. Then, as Miller began his tour pro career in the late '60s, Venturi moved into broadcasting - so Venturi often called tournaments in which Miller was playing.

Miller had no interest in a broadcasting career at the time, but he often watched golf on television. And he took notice of his two fellow San Francisco natives, Venturi and Rosburg, making an impact in the business.

"Ken was a phenomenal player and a really good broadcaster," Miller said. "He didn't say things that would be fall-out-of-your-chair funny or Johnny Miller-controversial, but he was very good."

Rosburg, who died in May 2009 at 82, was a two-sport athlete at Stanford who gained wide respect for his succinct style on the air. He leaned toward the cynical side, frequently surveying a player's predicament and declaring, "He's got no shot."

Even so, Rosburg paved the way for today's course reporters, most notably Maltbie and David Feherty of CBS.

"Rossie was Roger Maltbie before Roger Maltbie," Miller said.

Maltbie was a good player - he won five PGA Tour events and tied for fourth in the 1987 Masters - but he tripped upon his television career, much as Miller did. NBC called and invited him to an audition in the late 1980s, at a time when Maltbie was recovering from shoulder surgery.

He gave it a whirl and enjoyed it more than expected, especially when his shoulder required a second surgery. Maltbie worked the Hope and Ryder Cup for NBC in 1991, then officially was hired the following year.

More than two decades later, he still savors the adrenaline of live television and its parallels to playing the game.

"A lot of the intriguing things about competing at the highest level are also true in television," Maltbie said. "You've got to be ready whenever it comes to you. And when you do it right, and say what you needed to say, it's like hitting one on the screws. You get the same feeling."

NBC is not abandoning golf - it will still carry the Players Championship, among other tournaments - but Miller, especially, is closely associated with the U.S. Open. He fits the tournament perfectly, a blunt analyst covering an event known for punishing the world's finest players.

Miller and NBC started their Open reign in 1995 at Shinnecock Hills, where Corey Pavin carved out an unlikely victory. The ensuing years produced indelible images, from Payne Stewart edging Phil Mickelson at Pinehurst in 1999 ... to Tiger Woods eviscerating the field at Pebble Beach in 2000 ... to Woods outlasting Rocco Mediate at Torrey Pines in '08.

Fox landed Open rights for the next 12 years by showering the USGA with cash, to the tune of $93 million annually (more than $1.1 billion over the life of the contract).

"It's been a nice run," Miller said. "It's a little bit sad the USGA went the way they did. I hope they know we broke our backs to really prepare for it, and I don't know if that's going to be duplicated with Fox. ... It wasn't like our product was bad; this was just about money."

Next year, when the Open is held at Chambers Bay outside Tacoma, Wash., Joe Buck and Greg Norman will handle broadcast duties for Fox. It will be strange without Miller offering strong opinions and occasionally asking his buddy, "Whaddya think, Rog?"